Poem July 20, 1987 Issue

Undefeated

Barbara Cook

My mission and yours rest
in the secret place,
in spiritual identity,
in sonship with God
untouched by adversity,
by private trials claiming to put an end to faith,
claiming to defeat creativity,
claiming to choke love and turn us inward.

How can I go on? we cry.
But the cry is silenced
by an intensity of creative feeling, surprising us;
by a strength outside of self, a groaning to give birth,
the deepest yearning ever felt to pour out, to communicate,
to share, to affirm reality—
to defeat materialism.

We cannot be defeated.
Mission—outside the mortal cry—is divine influence coinciding
with our humanity.
The tares of adversity never touch the wheat of our spirituality.
Innocent love will keep on running pure and strong in us,
Undefeated.

Barbara Cook

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